Day 13

I think I'm seeing some light at the end of the tunnel. Status is most definitely Guarded, and all ghost shrimp are 100% confirmed dead. I have not seen a trace of a white cyst in two days. The blackout of yesterday and the lack of water changes must have kicked that last strain that was hanging in there. I don't want to jinx it and say I'm in the clear, but I think I mostly got it. Regardless, treatment will continue today-- a total of ten drops spread out over 16 hours at two doses. I turned the light back on because some of the plants were looking wilted.

I also took all the peat out of the filter cartridge. That might have been absorbing the meds or just diluting them enough to cripple the ich, not kill it.

Fish look good, plants look good for the most part.

I'm going to yank the carbon out of the Q-tank and put the clown loach in there today, if I can catch him, that is. I'll start treating the tank with metro. Rainbowfish is looking great, and the fins on the black skirt are healing. Both fish are eating, which is a good sign.

I'm going to also do a little rearranging in the 55 gallon. Now that I have three pieces of driftwood in there, they need to be spaced apart. I'll be moving the terracotta pieces to the right of the tank. This will also relieve some of the burden on the filter that gets all the pleco shit. Oh, that reminds me. There was literally a carpet of pleco shit around the new piece of driftwood. If the pleco were a school of pirahna and the wood a cow, it would have been skeletonized.

Going out of town tomorrow afternoon. Be back Sat. I'll do a massive water change in the ich tank tomorrow before I leave, then dose with 7-8 drops just to be sure.

- Josh
http://joshday.com